The invention relates to a method for processing a data packet and a network node.
In the packet-oriented transmission of items of information, the information data or application data to be transmitted are transmitted within a data packet as so-called user data, which are required for the control of the exchange of information. In addition, the data packet comprises a so-called header which additionally comprises items of control information. The data packet, which consists of a combination of the so-called payload, which comprises the user data, and the header, is normally transmitted as a unit via a communication network.
As a rule, a series of complex and energy intensive signal processing steps are necessary for the processing of the data packet in a network node embodied as a receiver before the information transmitted is available for further processing in the data link layer. Only then can an evaluation of the information of the header as well as the information available as user data in the payload be carried out.
In addition, the evaluation of the destination address of a received data packet is provided at the level of the data link layer or, respectively, destination MAC in an Ethernet header, wherein a decision is made as to whether the entire packet is to be evaluated and further processed at all. In conventional procedural approaches, this means that each network node has to process the received data packet in the physical layer before the evaluation of the receiver address can subsequently take place and a decision about the further processing of the payload data can be made. This involves all network nodes which receive the data packet carrying out a complex signal processing which however only needs to be performed by the at least one network node designed as a receiver, i.e. a network node in a unicast transmission or a plurality of network nodes in a multicast transmission, and to which the data packet is actually directed. In the event that all other network nodes likewise process the data package, this leads to an unnecessarily high energy consumption.